


Prescience

by Red_Lenses



Series: When The Storm Breaks [7]
Category: Rockman | Mega Man Classic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-03-29
Packaged: 2019-04-14 07:49:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14131485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Red_Lenses/pseuds/Red_Lenses
Summary: When Time suffers an unexpected system crash late at night, the truth about his work finally comes out.





	Prescience

Something felt wrong.

Whatever it was, Rock couldn’t tell. The house was quiet enough, excluding the kitten racing wildly through the halls in pursuit of some imagined prey. It had not been the noise that woke him, however, but simply a feeling of unease he could not quite pin down.

His internal clock told him it was just past one in the morning. He lay there in bed for a while longer, staring up at his ceiling in the darkness, before rolling out of bed. Quietly the young robot crossed the room to open his bedroom door, where he paused to listen. As far as he could tell he and the kitten were the only ones awake at this hour.

There was no sense in going back to bed now. With the strange sense of discomfort nibbling away at his mind he would never be able to relax. It was not as though he truly needed sleep like a human would, after all. Instead he slipped out of the room and padded barefoot down the hallway toward the kitchen, where he flicked on the light and found a familiar purple shape standing frozen by the E-tank cabinet.

Seeing Time outside of his own room at this hour was so surprising that for a moment Rock could only stare. In that moment he realized something was very wrong. Time’s body had gone completely rigid as he stood gripping the door, staring inside without seeing the contents. When the light had switched on he had shown no reaction at all, not even to shield his eyes from the unexpected brightness. It was as though he had powered down while standing upright.

“Time…?” Hesitantly Rock approached the motionless figure. Up close it was easy to see the expression of shock fixed upon Time’s face and the ominous purple glow that had consumed his eyes, nearly obscuring the blue of his irises.

“Time? Can you hear me? … No? … I think I need to get you to the lab.” The first step was to loosen the hand that was tightly gripping the cabinet door. To Rock’s great surprise, as soon as he touched Time’s fingers they instantly relaxed and let go. Rock reached out to lift Time but his hands closed on thin air as his brother crumpled to the ground. His helmet struck the tiles with a loud clang and a ringing echo that followed Rock as he sprinted toward the lab with the limp figure in his arms.

“Dad! Roll! Wake up! Something’s wrong with Time!”

—

Within minutes the familiar whir of machinery filled the lab as the equipment, most of which had been placed in hibernation mode for the night, came back to life. The twins had already connected their unconscious brother to the equipment and begun to brew some coffee in the time it took for Doctor Light to shuffle his way into the lab, still yawning and clearly not conscious enough to understand the magnitude of the situation. The moment he reached the doorway Roll was pressing a cup of coffee into his hand while Rock pushed a chair over for him.

“Hm? Ah, thank you,” the doctor mumbled vaguely, nearly spilling the coffee all over his face when he attempted to rub his eyes. “What’s this all about, Rock? All of us should still be in bed at this hour.”

“Time collapsed in the kitchen,” Rock explained hurriedly, already beginning to push the chair back over to the equipment. Doctor Light had barely sat down and instinctively grabbed the side of his seat with his free hand, helping himself balance despite the fact that Rock would never have let him fall.

Roll was already busy at the computers. “It looks like he suffered a major crash. I can’t understand all of this… What’s wrong with him, dad? Is it a virus?”

“Time Man catching a virus? That’s highly unlikely,” Doctor Light pointed out as Rock positioned him in front of the keyboard. He studied the screens for a moment, sipping his coffee, before glancing around the equipment to where Time lay. “He’s far too careful to allow anything like that to happen. No, it must be a hardware fault.”

The twins glanced nervously at each other and retreated to give their father space as he began to type. Both of them were fully aware that Time was incomplete and fragile, but he had been active for years without suffering a single crash that wasn’t caused by exposure to high voltage. The fact that it was happening now seemed to suggest that his body was beginning to give out.

“Rock, what was he doing before he collapsed?” Doctor Light questioned suddenly.

“What was he…? Uh, nothing, actually. I mean, he was just standing there when I found him. He looked like he’d frozen and wasn’t responding to anything. And his eyes were sort of… glowing.”

“In an unusual way?”

“They were glowing purple. I could barely see his normal optic display under it.”

The doctor made a noise of interest before resuming his work. Looking past his shoulder, Roll could see that he was running scans and checks on all of the processes related to Time’s eyes. She and her twin waited anxiously as the results trickled back in, each showing no abnormalities with his functioning.

When he was out of ideas, Doctor Light took another gulp of coffee and ran a hand through his hair. “We might have to ask him. Rock, Roll, get ready in case he needs to be restrained. I’m going to allow him to wake up.”

Obediently the two robots moved to stand over their brother, one on each side of the table. Roll glanced up anxiously at her twin, chewing on her lip, as she gently placed one hand on Time’s chest to hold him in place. Rock tried to give her an encouraging smile, but she could tell that even he wasn’t particularly confident about Time’s condition. Even now, with Doctor Light glancing around the monitors to see if he was waking up, the purple robot had shown no signs of life.

Without warning Time’s hand snapped up and seized Roll’s arm in an iron grip. She shrieked and recoiled, fighting to free herself even as Rock grabbed his arm to pull him back. But Time was entirely focused on her as he forced his eyes open and spoke, forcing out the words with a great effort. “Wily… Wily… is…”

Whatever he was about to say about Wily was lost when the door burst open so hard it rebounded off the wall behind it. All four spun around in time to see Oil charging into the lab, his weapon spout at the ready. “Hey! Get away from my… sis…” His shout trailed off as he stumbled to a halt, taken aback by the scene before him. “Time? Uh, Doc, what’s going on? I heard a scream…”

“I’m okay. Time just startled me,” Roll assured him, rubbing her arm where Time had grabbed it. He had allowed Rock to wrestle him back onto the table, where he now lay looking exhausted by the small effort.

“What about Time? He’s not looking so good.” Concerned, Oil took a step closer to the table. “Bro? What’s wrong?”

This time it was Doctor Light himself who answered as he walked around his desk toward where the robots were gathered. “We’ll let you know as soon as we know ourselves, Oil. Since you’re here, would you mind getting an E-tank for him?”

“Sure, no prob.” Oil cast one more worried look at his twin before retreating from the lab, this time closing the door more quietly behind himself.

Rock and Roll turned their attention back to Time as the doctor joined them by his side. “Time Man, can you hear me? Do you recognize me?”

“Doctor… Light,” Time croaked out.

“Very good. Do you remember what happened to you? Rock found you in the kitchen, seemingly experiencing a crash.”

Time had to rest for a moment before he managed to force out another word. “Vision.”

“How was your vision affected?” Roll asked gently. “He said your eyes were glowing purple… Did everything suddenly go purple for you? Has that ever happened before?”

“Vision,” Time repeated, turning his gaze toward Doctor Light. He could say no more, but to the twins’ bafflement their father seemed to understand perfectly. He turned and paced away from the table, one hand stroking his beard thoughtfully while the twins gazed at him in confusion.

Roll allowed him a moment of silence before speaking up again. “Dad? What does he mean by ‘vision’?”

Doctor Light was murmuring quietly under his breath. “… have to contact the Institute… this level of disruption… must consider the consequences…” He reached his seat and sank into it once again, drawing his coffee mug closer. “I’ll explain in a moment, Roll. Oil needs to hear this too. I don’t know whether Time has already told him, but with consequences like these he deserves to know.”

Fortunately they didn’t have long to wait before Oil came hurrying back in, an E-tank clutched in his hand. With the twins’ help Time was soon propped up into a sitting position on the table. He looked quite displeased about the situation, although it was hard to tell whether he was more bothered by the drink being manually poured down his throat or by his own inability to sit up and hold it himself. The other robots certainly didn’t care as much about his dignity as they did about helping him recover.

Doctor Light watched for a moment before releasing a slow sigh. “Everyone, there is something very important you all need to know about Time’s work at the Chronos Institute. Oil, you in particular should have been told much sooner than this. I don’t know if he told you himself…”

“Is it about these mysterious upgrades he’s been gettin’?” Oil enquired, a worried frown creasing the lips hidden by his scarf.

“Yes. It has everything to do with them.” The doctor flashed a quick look at Time before setting down his cup again. “Let me explain…

“As you all know, Time is incomplete simply because the technology to fulfil his purpose does not yet exist. He was never supposed to be activated until it was. But due to Albert’s actions both Time and Oil were activated early, and I could never bring myself to simply place him back into storage once he was returned to us. That was where the Chronos Institute came in. It seemed the perfect job for Time, studying exactly that which he was intended to control.”

The three robots glanced at each other; they all knew this already. But Doctor Light was not done yet. “Last year several researchers from the Institute contacted me with an idea. I gave my permission for them to go ahead with it - so long as Time agreed, of course, which he did. This plan was intended to bring him closer to his designated purpose. He was to be fitted with several experimental devices which should give him more control over the flow of time.

“These upgrades did not perform as expected. Throughout extensive testing Time was found to have no more control than he had previously. The plan was about to be discarded when something most extraordinary happened. Time suddenly experienced a vision of the future which allowed him to bring attention to a vital error in one of the Institute’s other experiments, preventing massive damage to important machinery. After several tests and similar visions, it was concluded that he was truly able to see into the future and act to prevent what he foresaw.

“The experiment was allowed to continue. Time has been reporting to me as well as the Institute about these premonitions of the future and I must say I find it fascinating. What I don’t appreciate, however,” he turned his stern gaze on Time, who was now sitting without support, “is being left unaware of just how much of a toll these visions are having on your body. I was led to believe that these upgrades were causing only minor additional strain, Time.”

The purple robot averted his gaze. Doctor Light frowned at him for a moment longer before shaking his head. “I suppose you were worried I’d request for the experiment to be cancelled if I knew. We need to have a serious discussion about this.”

He drained the last of his coffee and set down the cup. “Rock, Roll, Oil, the three of you should return to bed. Thank you very much for your help tonight.”

His words were a clear dismissal. The three robots didn’t argue but left the lab quietly, murmuring their goodnights as they retreated up the darkened hallway.

Oil’s bedroom was the closest to the lab. He didn’t say a word as he split off from the others and vanished inside, shutting the door quietly behind himself. Only when he had gone did Rock and Roll break into excited whispers about Time’s newest talent. Their discussion continued all the way up the hall to their own rooms, which they lingered outside for a few more moments of intense discussion before parting ways.

The silence in the lab was complete as Doctor Light placed the machinery back into sleep mode and disconnected the many cables his children had attached to Time. The robot kept his gaze averted through the entire process. His helmet was handed back without a word and he slid it onto his head, waiting for the inevitable lecture about his own safety and the heated debate that would likely take most of the night.

“You saw Albert again.”

It was a statement rather than a question. Time nodded. “I did.”

Doctor Light took a seat beside the table. Time had been coming to him for months with reports of his visions, many of which concerned him greatly. Wily was in ill health, Time had informed him. Somehow the glimpses he had caught of life at the fortress seemed perfectly normal, as though most of Wily’s own robots were unaware of his illness, but Time had reported that the few who dealt with him most seemed to be tightening their guard over him until he seemed to almost be their prisoner.

Doctor Light hardly dared to ask this time. “How is he?”

Finally Time glanced up and met his gaze again. The words he spoke were the ones that Doctor Light had dreaded, and yet the ones that he had somehow known were coming ever since Time had regained the ability to speak.

“Doctor Wily is dead.”


End file.
